The National Interest: Kabul is a democracy in name only. Many non-Pashtuns see the political integration of the Taliban as an intra-Pashtun reconciliation process—not all-Afghan—that will deepen the Pashtunization of the power structure under Ghani, helping consolidate the ethnic group’s dominance. Under the national unity government agreement , Afghanistan was to have convened a loya jirga
Michael Hughes: New military commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan Austin Miller on his first day on the job signaled that he would continue America’s stale strategy which itself is a recipe for perpetual conflict. However, there are some so-called strategists who have accomplished the impossible by concocting ideas even worse than the one that has
Haroun Mir via Asia Times: India’s mishandling of local Afghan politics over the past 17 years has significantly reduced its influence among major political parties in Afghanistan. While the Afghan people continue to appreciate its contributions to the reconstruction and development of the country, its traditional allies who fought against the Taliban in the 1990s have
Brad Taylor via Bloomberg: Erik Prince thinks 6,000 mercenaries can do what 110,000 troops could not. That’s a deadly mistake. Taking a close look Blackwater’s role in Iraq shows why: profit over policy. While the company was initially formed with vetted Navy SEALs, over time the need to ramp up operations led to the firm
Michael Hughes: Afghanistan for at least the fifth time in the past eight years has experienced a “Tet-like” offensive – that is, if you believe military pundits, scholars and reporters who often cannot resist historical analogies even if it comes at the expense of true clarity. This is not to say the siege of Ghazni
Eisa Ayoobi via The Globe Post: Ashraf Ghani and Zalmay Khalilzad have been the most influential Afghan-Americans to impact U.S.-Afghanistan relations over the decades. Their education and Washington-based experience have earned them rhetoric sway and a vastly influential network of friends. However, their ethnonationalism-aspired Afghanistan “vision” has cost the U.S. thousands of lives and “trillions of
Political commentators and cartoonists are taking aim at President Ashraf Ghani’s recent comment about offering ice cream to the Taliban. ***
Michael Hughes: Imran Khan has been referred to as Pakistan’s Donald Trump, an apt comparison on one level given they are both mercurial, egoistical, nationalistic and demagogic. However, one main difference is that the playboy cricketer turned Islamic firebrand colluded with the deep state to win his election. Although Rawalpindi has always called the shots, having a
Javid Ahmad via The National Interest: Afghanistan is struggling to recover from damage done by war and tumultuous politics. To be sure, despite progress made towards self-reliance, the Afghan economy is still mostly donor-dependent. Despite a marginal increase in the total government expenditures between 2014 and 2017, donor grants provided to offset the Afghan budget represented an
IANS: The moment is laden with irony for President Ashraf Ghani in Kabul. The emergence of a Pathan in Islamabad should have provided him with comfort. Instead he is having kittens: the Pathan on the other side has an agenda which is totally at cross purposes with Ghani’s. Imran’s agenda would boost his popularity in the